In bed

When Nicole and I were dating, I noticed the profound difference between our beds. My bed was a thing, an object, a piece of furniture. Her bed was a place, a space, almost a room unto itself, and functioned principally as a container for other things. At a single point in time, in her bed you would find appliances -- at minimum, both a phone handset and her free-floating, battery-powered alarm clock, with one or more remote controls likely to be buried somewhere under the covers -- clothing, books and magazines, and who knows what else. My bed, by comparison, was bare, with nothing more than pillows, sheets, and blankets.

For a while, after we married, I was winning, with our bed a marvel of simplicity. But time and Cassie have changed all that: when I got out of bed this morning, I left behind, in addition to Nicole, two pacifiers, a SwaddleMe velcro-blanket-thing, one regular receiving blanket, a onesie, a white-noise machine, two plush toys, and a small but surprisingly pesty infant.